We purchased our first Microdairy design 30g vat this spring and drove down to Southern Utah to pick up. This started a slow slide into building of a new Grade A dairy parlor and cheese processing plant (aka the creamery). We converted 1000+ sq ft in our shop. The new milking parlor will be able to milk 10 does at a time with a clean in place to save me time and my back.We are hoping to be Grade A by end of September and producing some wonderful cheeses for all to enjoy. All the cheeses will be small batch, hand made. There will also be an aging facility so we can try new varieties of aged cheese. The farm will be its own entity as "Goshen Farm" but all products will be sold under our new name "Eden Creamery" with milk produced by "Goshen Farm" so keep an eye out for the new logo of "Eden Creamery".Photos to follow or follow us on facebook under "Goshenfarm"

Around the Farm:Fall is finally here. The does should all be pregnant. I will send blood samples in 30 days to Biotracking in Northern Idaho for pregnancy and CAE testing.I did decide to breed one of the does to a Golden Guernsey buck. I am excited to bring this rare breed into out breeding program. I have waited so long to add a second breed to our herd for two reasons. One, I truly wanted to get my herd management down for my Oberhasli girls and second, I wanted to pick a breed that had a high butterfat to enhance our cheeses. Adding the Guernsey will be a slow process since I will be breeding up but it will be a fun learning process.We should have a total of 8 girls milking next spring. I will take my best 7 to use in cheeses and sell raw milk the last will be used to help feed kids. This will be the first time I have milked this many does so should be interesting.Fall chore list has been compiled:

Clean feed shed

Order/pick-up/unload 1 ton of feed (I unfortunately have to do this by hand. The hubby insists on keeping a 80hp tractor instead of a decent sized 30hp LOL)

Insulate chicken coop

Fill barn with new gravel mix (raise the floor a bit to keep moisture out).

Rake/remove any extra manure from pens

4th cutting of hay

Prep feeders for winter

Water heaters set-up

Family: The two older kids have started doing outside farm chores on a more regular basis. Collecting eggs in the coop as well as finding those hidden egg spots in the haystack is a fun chore for the kids. They have figured out favorite egg spots that the chickens keep going back to so they have fun checking them. A wheelbarrow, rake and shovel gets the pens cleaned. Unfortunately this job usually peaks interest for five minutes and I have to pick up the rest but at least they are learning to rake. Digging post holes has become a fun chore since digging is involved LOL. My youngest (2 yrs) already knows how to lead the goat kids from this year at about 16mths. She drags them by the collar saying "Come, Come" and puts them in the pen. My two oldest should be doing showmanship next year with a goat kid they choose to practice with. I can truly say I am glad my parents choice to raise me around animals, gardening, and raising our own food. I see my kids blossoming on the farm and am glad we made the choice to do the same. Last spring when my son was helping me outside he asked if we were ever to move to Israel (this is where my husband is from) would we move to a farm. I told him maybe but some people don't live on a farm and it is not always possible to live on a farm. He looked at me and said "that is very sad, I always want to live on a farm".

The last of the older mixed ewes went to the sale last Saturday. Truthfully I was ready to see them go. The lambs needed less competition and I needed less noise in the barn yard.We will have bummer lambs available mid-summer and late-winter. We will be getting bummers in November as well as February.

After much soul searching we have decided to decrease our current East Fresian Herd from 12 ewes to 4. As the main farm hand on the place I can't keep up with feeding, cleaning, and keeping a standard of herd management I want with the herd. The ewes have gone to good milking homes and keeping 4 ewe lambs for the next breeding year allows us to keep a few sheep.

Our focus is now on our registered Oberhasli herd. Next year the herd will grow from 4 milkers to 6 milkers (so lots of milk for sale).Herd management is very important for me and I want to grow the herd slowly so I can adjust my management style to fit the herd. Keeping all the lives

I went out this morning to doing the chores and found a lamb wandering about crying. I could tell he was new since he had no ear tag and he was still a bit bloody. After initial inspection he seemed healthy but wanted his mommy. I found the ewe out in the pen with two other lambs. The lambs were all soon in a clean stall for bonding time with mom but the ewe had other ideas. She wanted nothing to do with the third lamb and expressed this with pushes and shoves and attempts of stepping on the poor thing. In attempt to get her to take the baby I even pushed the ewe up against the wall and milked her and rubbed her milk all over the lamb. After about 20 minutes I gave up and my son got his wish for a lamb in the laundry room. Lamb is eating and doing great.